The brightest lights generally appear amidst the deepest darkness.
As we sat shiv'a for our beloved son, I was called to the phone. It was Menachem Friedman on the other line. He was calling to inform us that, if we had no objection, he was commissioning a sofer to write a new Sefer Torah in memory of Ari z.t.l. We cried, but it was a sweeter cry.
Of all the thousands of acts of chesed performed for us in these last 17 months since Ari fell in battle, few have been more uplifting than knowing that Ari's tragic death would "give birth" to a Torat Chayim, a living Torah that, G-d willing, will soon reside in the Ohel Ari Jewish Learning Center and "speak" to many Jews over many years.
One of death's cruelest powers is to rob us of a sense of order. Our world proceeds more or less on schedule, in a normal fashion. Suddenly, death invades and everything is thrown into confusion: How could this happen? Where is justice? Where is reason? Who - if anyone - is running the ship? Or are we on a collision course with chaos? Do we live in a civilized, sensible universe, or are we back to primordial tohu v'vohu?
Enter the Torah. Created 2,000 years before the Earth, it is the blueprint for order in an otherwise meaningless, haphazard cosmos. The Torah helps us define good and evil, right and wrong. It stares existentialism "in the faith" and declares: "Man has purpose, Man has meaning. There is a plan; there is a beginning and an end."
Indeed, the Oral Law is divided into fields of study called "Orders".
This week's parsha contains 53 mitzvot. It follows on the heels of the Aseret HaDibrot. You may ask: "Why aren't the 10 Commandments enough? Why engage in 'overkill' by legislating every possible nuance of human behavior?"
The answer is that laws define and protect our security and our sanity. Without laws, we would wander aimlessly about in the jungle of confusion. In the whirlwind of doubt and desperation, I hang on to the atzei chayim of the Torah, and I am grounded, rooted, sheltered.
This Sunday, Rosh Chodesh Adar, we shall, G-d willing, dedicate the Friedman Torah, together with our friends (you are our family, really). The light of this Torah Ora will, we pray, brighten many lives, including our own.
It is, in a word, just what the Almighty ordered.
As we sat shiv'a for our beloved son, I was called to the phone. It was Menachem Friedman on the other line. He was calling to inform us that, if we had no objection, he was commissioning a sofer to write a new Sefer Torah in memory of Ari z.t.l. We cried, but it was a sweeter cry.
Of all the thousands of acts of chesed performed for us in these last 17 months since Ari fell in battle, few have been more uplifting than knowing that Ari's tragic death would "give birth" to a Torat Chayim, a living Torah that, G-d willing, will soon reside in the Ohel Ari Jewish Learning Center and "speak" to many Jews over many years.
One of death's cruelest powers is to rob us of a sense of order. Our world proceeds more or less on schedule, in a normal fashion. Suddenly, death invades and everything is thrown into confusion: How could this happen? Where is justice? Where is reason? Who - if anyone - is running the ship? Or are we on a collision course with chaos? Do we live in a civilized, sensible universe, or are we back to primordial tohu v'vohu?
Enter the Torah. Created 2,000 years before the Earth, it is the blueprint for order in an otherwise meaningless, haphazard cosmos. The Torah helps us define good and evil, right and wrong. It stares existentialism "in the faith" and declares: "Man has purpose, Man has meaning. There is a plan; there is a beginning and an end."
Indeed, the Oral Law is divided into fields of study called "Orders".
This week's parsha contains 53 mitzvot. It follows on the heels of the Aseret HaDibrot. You may ask: "Why aren't the 10 Commandments enough? Why engage in 'overkill' by legislating every possible nuance of human behavior?"
The answer is that laws define and protect our security and our sanity. Without laws, we would wander aimlessly about in the jungle of confusion. In the whirlwind of doubt and desperation, I hang on to the atzei chayim of the Torah, and I am grounded, rooted, sheltered.
This Sunday, Rosh Chodesh Adar, we shall, G-d willing, dedicate the Friedman Torah, together with our friends (you are our family, really). The light of this Torah Ora will, we pray, brighten many lives, including our own.
It is, in a word, just what the Almighty ordered.